“I might not have been, if I’d known you were looking,” she said, raising a brow in question.
“We finally gave up and went back home,” Raven explained. “Then the package arrived, containing Dearborne’s journals, and your letter, telling us the story of how you lost your beloved Nicodimus and what you planned to try to do.” She covered Arianna’s hand. “And there was this address on the label.”
Arianna sighed resignedly. She should have known her sister would follow her here. “The journals, yes. Did you . . . did you read them?”
Raven closed her eyes and nodded, no doubt recalling the horrific tales those journals held. Then she faced Arianna again. “Did you find him?” Raven asked. “Did you find this man you were so determined to resurrect?”
Arianna nodded tiredly, and led them into the kitchen, and to the table. Raven and Duncan sat down, and she put a pot of coffee on to brew, and a kettle for tea, which Duncan still preferred. “I found him.”
“And?” Raven leaned forward in her chair.
“It worked. I resurrected him.”
“My God,” Duncan whispered. “After six centuries, you brought him back.”
I nodded with a telling look toward the bedroom door. “Yes. He’s weak, confused. His memory is sketchy. But on one thing, he’s very clear. Nicodimus hates me, blames me for his death, just as he did then. But . . . I’d expected as much.”
“Oh, Arianna.” Raven got up quickly and came to take the kettle from her hands. “Sit, darling. Rest. Let me do this.”
She ushered Arianna into a chair and took over.
“Why don’t you just tell him the truth?” Duncan asked softly.
Arianna lifted her head and looked at him. “You don’t even know him, Duncan. How can you be so sure it would do any good?”
He offered her a gentle smile. “I know you didn’t betray him the way he died believing you did. You couldn’t. Not a man you love.”
“Loved,” she corrected quickly.
Duncan sent Raven a swift glance, a silent message. “If you say so.”
Arianna leaned back in her chair, shoulders slumping. “He doesn’t even remember that his first wife and his sons are dead, Duncan. He keeps asking for them, and I just can’t. . .”
As her voice trailed off, Duncan covered her hand with one of his. “Don’t you think you ought to tell him, Arianna? Wouldn’t it be for the best? I know it might seem a cruel thing to do, but it seems to me it’s more cruel to let him go on not knowing.”
Arianna shook her head. “His memories are coming back slowly. He’ll realize soon enough.” She shrugged. “Besides, I doubt he’d believe a word I said at this point.”
“But Arianna, you restored his life!” Raven protested, turning from the small range and coming back to the table.
“I don’t think he believes that, either. He’d be out of here if he had the strength to leave.”
“Well then, thank goodness he doesn’t! Arianna, he remembers the world as it was centuries ago. He has no clue how to get by in it today.”
Arianna nodded slowly. “I had planned to help him, to teach him . . . but. . .”
“No matter. What do you say I pay the fellow a visit, hmm?” Duncan asked. “Perhaps he’d feel a bit better talking to another man.”
“You’re welcome to try,” Arianna whispered.
With a nod, Duncan got to his feet, but Arianna gripped his hand. “Be very careful what you say, Duncan. Nicodimus has no idea how much time has passed, and I’d prefer he not know just yet. He has so much to deal with already.”
“I won’t give anything away, I promise, though I disagree with you on the wisdom of that.” He squeezed her hand.
“Tell him I’ll bring his breakfast soon.”
Duncan nodded and left the room, following the directions Arianna gave for finding her houseguest. Arianna rose to begin preparing a meal for the lot of them, and Raven got up as well. “Don’t cook. Let’s walk to that lovely little bakery in town and get bread and pastries for breakfast, instead.”
Arianna smiled at her sister. The sunshine on her face would feel good today. But then she sent a worried frown toward the back of the house.
“It’ll only take us a few minutes,” Raven insisted. “I’m sure Duncan can hold his own against a man who can barely stand upright for that long.” She looked deeply into Arianna’s eyes, her onyx ones filled with reassurances. “You’re not on your own anymore, my sister. Duncan and I are here to help, and we’ll stay for as long as you need us.”
Blinking away the unexpected rise of tears, Arianna finally nodded. “All right. Let me just put on some fresh clothes.”
* * * *
WHEN THE DOOR opened, I looked up, expecting to see the wounded eyes of my captor again–and they had been wounded. As if my suspicion of her caused her inexplicable pain. If she truly were my enemy, then why would she react that way to my accusations? It made no sense. And yet the certainty that I had indeed hurt her remained.
But it was not Arianna who entered my prison. Instead, it was a man I did not know. Tall he was, dark of hair, with a well-muscled frame that bespoke strength–strength such as I had possessed once. His clothing was as strange as Arianna’s was to me. I stiffened, instantly suspicious of him.
“Easy, Nicodimus. I’m a friend.”
I did not relax, though his eyes were indeed friendly as he perused me. “If you are a friend, you will take me out of this place,” I suggested.
He smiled. “As soon as you’re strong enough, I’ll do just that–if you still want to go. You have my word on it.”
I narrowed my eyes on him. “Who are you? If I know you, I have no memory of it.”
He came closer, extending a hand. “Duncan Wallace,” he said. I took the hand he offered. His grip was cool and firm, and the jolt that passed between us gave me to know he was an immortal, like me. “And this is the first time we’ve met.” Before I could even ask, he pulled down the waistband of the sturdy leggings he wore, to show me the crescent on his right flank. He was one of the Light, then.
“Then you are a friend of Arianna’s?” I asked him.
He hesitated. “She has been a friend to me, yes.”
“Trust her at your peril, Duncan Wallace,” I told him grimly.
He sighed deeply, drew up a chair and took it with ease. “I do trust her,” he said. “But she seems to think you don’t.”
“I do not. And with good reason.”
“Wronged you once, did she?”
I nodded. “No doubt you disbelieve it.”
“No,” he said. “I believe it. Arianna is impulsive and wild and often reckless. But her heart is good. And if she did wrong you, Nicodimus, then I believe she regrets it with everything in her. And she’s trying very hard to make it up to you now.”
Those words gave me pause. I lifted my brows, searching his face for a sign he was lying to me, but saw only openness and honesty in his eyes. “Has she told you the details of how she betrayed me?”
Duncan shook his head. “Don’t you remember them?”
“No,” I said. “Only small bits of certainty that she did, and that it cost me dearly.”
Duncan drew a deep breath and sighed. “Perhaps it would be best to reserve final judgment until you remember what truly happened. Maybe . . . maybe there’s some explanation for what she did.”
“It is so infuriating to not remember!” I closed my eyes tightly.
“I know. I’ve been in a very similar situation myself, you know. And not so long ago.”
This caught my attention and I eyed him again. “Truly?” I asked.
He nodded hard. “That’s why I thought I might be of some help to you now. I know how maddening it is to have bits of memory that tease at the edges of your mind, only to vanish again before you can grasp them. I know how difficult it is to put those bits together in some way that makes sense. But it will come together, in time. I promise you.”
“Were you resurrected, as I
was, then?”
“No. I died trying to save the life of a witch. And was reborn without the memory of our shared past together. But that memory has returned to me now.”
I believed him. And for the first time since I had awakened, I felt some semblance of hope come to life in my chest. I was unwilling to believe fully in a man who was a friend of my enemy, and yet I felt instinctively that he could be trusted. That he wished to aid me in this, just as he said he did.
“How long?” I asked him.
His lips thinned. “I wish I could tell you. In my case, it was only a matter of a couple of weeks. It might very well be less with you.”
“Or it might be a good deal more,” I said softly.
“It’s only time, my friend. You’re immortal. Time is something you have in abundance.”
I nodded. “Patience, however, is not,” I said.
He grinned at me. “We must be related then. Distant cousins, perhaps?”
A reluctant smile tugged at my lips. I could easily come to like this strange man. “What land are we in, Duncan, that the natives dress so strangely?” I nodded at his clothes. The sturdy blue that covered his legs, much like those Arianna had worn. And the garment on top that buttoned up the front and tucked into them.
He seemed taken aback by my question, and relief filled his eyes when the door opened again and Arianna entered, carrying heaping platters of fragrant baked goods. Another woman, taller, and very dark of hair and eyes, entered behind her, carrying a tray laden with drinking vessels and containers of brew that steamed.
“Breakfast has arrived,” the dark one announced cheerfully. The two women lowered the feast to a nearby table as I eyed the newcomer. A woman of rare beauty, she was. And her coloring reminded me of someone else. Another woman, very dark and tall. Slender as a reed, I thought, as a brief, flickering image of her crept into my mind. She’d loved me very dearly . . . and I her, but. . . .
The image vanished as quickly as it had come, and I blinked away my frustration.
“Who are you?” I asked the woman.
Arianna parted her lips, but before she could utter a word, the woman said, “My name is Raven,” she said. “I’m Arianna’s sister.”
My brows lowered, and my mind whirled. “But . . . but Arianna’s sister is dead. . .”
Three pairs of eyes widened, and Raven clapped a hand to her mouth. But already, more memories were returning.
* * * *
MARTEN HAD WATCHED Arianna and her female companion as they walked the short distance to the bakery, and again as they returned to the small house, their arms loaded down with food. He’d always hoped to come across the beautiful Arianna again someday. The few times he’d had word that she’d been seen in any given place, however, he’d arrived only to find her gone. Or, if he did glimpse her, she would be in the company of this other woman. He supposed he could have found her, if he’d put his mind to it. And yet he hadn’t. He didn’t like to think too deeply about why that was. But he knew, and the knowledge was a bitter pill indeed. She’d been very convincing that day so long ago. And in the time he’d held her captive . . . he’d come to care for her in a way that was completely foreign to him. When she had come to him, when she had returned his ardent kisses . . . there had been a few brief moments when he’d allowed himself to believe she cared for him as well.
The truth of her motives had cut him deeply. Her rejection . . . it had shamed him. So much that he still felt pain when he recalled it.
Part of him feared that when he saw her again, he would see pure hatred in her eyes as he had seen that day. It was an experience he had no desire to relive. So while he had fantasized about seeing her again, he’d done nothing to make it come about.
Now, however, events had taken a strange turn. Perhaps he would take this chance to have her, at last. He’d always wanted her. She, he reminded himself, had rejected him, tricked him, used him. Now that she was here, and he was so close to her, he found he had an even stronger urge to exact his revenge. Perhaps he would at that, when he finished with his other business.
Every year on the anniversary of Nicodimus’s death, Marten visited his burial site to dance on his grave and gloat over his victory. It had been easy enough to find the burial site of his oldest enemy, for a beautiful young woman driving a wagon alone, with a satin-wrapped body bouncing in the back had been a remarkable sight in those days. So the few people who’d seen Arianna pass by had remembered her.
It ate at him that he’d never had the chance to take Nicodimus’s heart himself, to drain it of its very life. Dearborne had stolen that from him.
He’d heard old Dearborne had finally met his match. He was nearly as glad to see that old immortal dead as he had been Nicodimus. He’d hidden from that old man for centuries, in fear Dearborne would find him and kill him for no more reason than the sport of it.
At any rate, this year, Marten’s annual visit to the grave of Nicodimus had been different. This time he’d found the grave empty, barren, though refilled with freshly turned earth. And thoughts began to pound at his brain.
Dearborne, the treacherous cur who’d used him and would have likely killed him had the opportunity not been wrested from his grip, had hinted that the second death was not necessarily the final one for immortals. That there was a way even it could be reversed. And if anyone would know, it would have been that old man. For he’d captured and toyed with countless immortals in the time Marten had known him. He’d made use of Marten’s own dungeons for his gruesome experiments on Light High Witches, before killing them in the end. He reminded Marten of a cruel cat, the way it will torture and tease a mouse until there is so little life left in the creature that the sport is gone. Then the cat will devour it.
Yes, Dearborne had hinted, but he’d refused to tell Marten what he knew. And he’d kept his precious journals under lock and key. But now . . . now the thought Dearborne had planted in Marten’s mind returned. Was resurrection from the second death possible? Could an immortal whose heart had been taken, be revived? The possibility tormented him, especially when he saw that open grave, and learned that Arianna was right here in this town. Had Arianna somehow learned of Dearborne’s secrets, and used them to revive his blood enemy? Was that bastard Nicodimus once again alive and breathing?
If he was, Marten vowed, he would not be for long. And there was only one way to find out. Watch Arianna. If Nicodimus were alive somewhere, he would come to her, sooner or later. The beautiful Arianna would serve as bait for Marten’s trap.
Just as she had done before.
* * * *
ARIANNA COULD HACE choked her sister for the slip. But it was an honest mistake. Raven had known Nicodimus as a child, in another lifetime, one that had ended centuries ago. Naturally she would have no memory of that. And Arianna had only given her sister the barest of details about her own brief with Nicodimus. No, this was her own fault, not her sister’s.
“I’m so sorry,” Raven whispered, backing away, eyes wide.
“No. Don’t be.” Arianna moved closer to the bed where Nicodimus sat, as still as stone. “You know Nicodimus is going to need clothes. Why don’t you two go into the village and see what you can find? My purse is in the kitchen.”
Raven nodded, understanding. Duncan gave Arianna’s shoulder a squeeze before they both turned and left. Alone with Nicodimus, Arianna wondered how much to tell him, how much he already might know.
“I . . . assumed I had only been in the grave a short while,” Nicodimus said softly, slowly. His gaze seemed turned inward as he searched his mind. “But if she is your dead sister . . . grown now. . .” He lifted his gaze. “Did you revive her in the same way? I . . . I thought you said I was the first?”
Arianna sighed, pushing a hand through her hair. “No. No, Nicodimus. My sister drowned when she was but a child. That memory will likely return to you soon. She wasn’t immortal then. She didn’t die because some Dark One had taken her heart as you did. She died . . . trying to save my lif
e.”
Nicodimus closed his eyes, nodding slowly. “And so returned to her next lifetime as an immortal.”
Arianna nodded. “Yes. And I had to wait until she was reborn into that new lifetime to find her again.”
His brows rose, but other than that, there was no reaction. “Your sister is grown,” he murmured. “Born again, and a woman grown.” It was as if he were clarifying this in his own mind. “Immortal, this time.”
She nodded. “Yes. She’s one of us now.”
“And her age?”
He wanted to know how much time had passed. He wanted her to tell him. Gods, it would be so hard for him. She didn’t answer him. She couldn’t.
“I remember my Anya,” he said slowly. “Young and fair. Hair like fire. My sons, just lads . . . but they must be grown now. And Anya . . . older. ‘Tis more than my mind can grasp. She . . . she was pregnant with our third child when last I recall seeing her. A girl.” Then his brows bunched in concentration. “But how could I know the child was a girl unless . . . .”
“Nicodimus, don’t push yourself,” Arianna pled, but it was too late. His head came up suddenly, eyes wide and anguished as the memory hit him. She saw it come, saw the utter pain that made his face into a mask of torment.
“Oh, Gods, she died! Anya died and our babe with her!” He pressed his hands to either side of his head as his eyes moved rapidly from side to side, seeing nothing but the memory, she knew. His breaths came fast and short. “She died, she died in childbirth. Oh, Anya, sweet Anya . . .” Tears brimmed in his eyes, and he lowered his head, covering his face with his hands.
Unable to bear seeing him in so much agony, Arianna went to the bed, sank onto its edge, and put her arms around him. She hugged him close, stroked his hair. “I’m sorry, Nicodimus. I’m so sorry, more than I can tell you. I wish . . . I wish I could take this pain away.”
He straightened slowly, staring hard into her eyes. “What of the boys, Arianna? What of my sons?”
Eternal Love: The Immortal Witch Series Page 59
